Kenyans look to
China support in sports
development from the FOCAC summit

NAIROBI (Xinhua) --
Kenna sportsmen will have China to thank for their help in
developing and exposing their talent as the 2018 Beijing Summit
of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) gets underway
from Monday.

China’s help in building the Kasarani
Stadium in Nairobi has played a major role in promoting Kenya’s
sports, especially indoor competitions like swimming, basketball
and volleyball.

Currently, Kenyan youth are witnessing the blossoming career
of winger Ayub Timbe, who is playing for Chinese Super League
side Beijing Renhe and many will look to take his path to
enhance their careers in sports.

Recently, Finance Cabinet Secretary Henry Rotich said on the
country’s treasury website that he will be seeking better ways
to expand corporation with China in all areas including sports.

The Chinese made their first impression in Kenya back in 1987
when they build the iconic Kasarani Stadium, which hosted the
All Africa Games.

Kenya has recently sent a team of 25 table tennis players to
China for training.

The team from Kenya’s Oshwal Sports Complex Table Tennis Club
has just returned to Nairobi after a month-long professional
training stint at the Zhengding International Table Tennis
Training Center in Hebei Province, China.

The one-month training saw the players learn the latest
playing techniques from the world’s leading nation in Table
Tennis.

Kenya Table Tennis Association President Andrew Mudibo said
the time spent in China will yield a big impact on the local
standards and the current level of table tennis in Kenya.

"China is the best in the world and you improve a lot when
you learn from the best.

"This is what we want to boost our standards," he said.

In 2015, 16 members of China’s national women’s athletics
team pitched camp at the High altitude Training Center in Iten
for training ahead of the World Championships, which were staged
in Beijing.

With President Uhuru Kenyatta leading Kenya’s delegation to
China this week for the FOCAC meeting, more is expected in the
area of sports development.

As of 2010, there were 50 sports arenas across Africa that
were built with Chinese support, including Kasarani Stadium in
Kenya.

It has recently gone under renovation by the Chinese Wi-Wu
construction company to a tune of 200 million dollars, which
included laying of a new astro-turf tartan that hosted the 2017
World Under-18 Championships.

Council of East and Central Africa Football Associations (CECAFA)
Secretary General Nicholas Musonye has lauded the corporation
China and Kenya have developed.

"We only have one stadium in Kenya of international stature
and it’s courtesy of China," he said.

Musonye said other countries in the region that are currently
carrying out similar projects include Rwanda, Ethiopia, Uganda
and Burundi..

EARLIER REPORT:

From Guangzhou to Nairobi,
making dreams a reality

by Xinhua writers Liu Baiyun, Wang
Pan and Jin Zheng GUANGZHOU China (Xinhua) --Walking on Baohanzhi Street in
Guangzhou, capital city of south China’s Guangdong Province,
Felly Mwamba greeted a patrolling security guard in Chinese,
spoke French as he introduced local businesses to a fellow
countryman, and was randomly stopped by an acquaintance for a
quick chat.

Mwamba, a businessman from the Democratic Republic of the
Congo, is known as a "civil diplomat" of the Africans living in
the Dengfeng community, where over 800 African residents live
among more than 1200 registered foreigners.

But the flow of people is two way, and a growing number of
Chinese are calling Africa home. Alongside rapidly developing
bilateral ties, China-Africa people-to-people exchanges are
booming.

Baohanzhi Street, where Mwamba lives, is nicknamed "African
Street."

After living in Guangzhou for 15 years, Mwamba has earned
himself a reputation for building bridges between Chinese and
Africans in the city and beyond.

Guangzhou is home to the densest population of Africans in
the country and is China’s main port for entry and exit.

In 2017, roughly 320,000 Africans entered or left China
through Guangzhou, according to local customs.

"I’m lucky to be here at the best time of China-Africa
trade," Mwamba said in fluent Chinese.

"I often tell my friends that no matter where my business
extends to, China will always be my base."

Every day tons of made-in-China products, such as clothes,
household appliances, mobile phones and motorcycles, are shipped
to Africa.

Meanwhile, African products such as crops, sea food and
coffee are exported to China.

"The Xiaobei business district where Baohanzhi Street is
located fully reflects the pragmatic, win-win and inclusive
features of China-Africa economic and trade cooperation," said
Liu Jisen, executive vice president of the Institute for African
Studies at Guangdong University of Foreign Studies.

"Many African people regard Guangzhou, especially Xiaobei, as
the starting point of their dreams," Liu said.

As similar African communities in other Chinese cities such
as Yiwu in Zhejiang Province are likewise embracing
opportunities, a growing number of Chinese neighborhoods are
emerging in Africa..

For many Chinese living in
Nairobi, a typical Saturday morning in the
Kenya-China Supermarket is spent eating steamed rice
rolls and chatting in a traditional tea house.

.
"I think with the Belt and Road Initiative, more and more
Chinese people like me will get the chance to pursue their
dreams in Africa," she said.

In Kenya’s Maasai Mara National
Reserve, a Chinese man dubbed "Simba" has many titles, such as
"friend of Mara" and "hero of wildlife conservation."

Simba, whose real name is Zhuo Qiang, is the first Chinese to
work full-time on wildlife conservation in Africa, and the first
Chinese to register a non-profit organization on the continent.

Years of hard work in jointly building a wildlife theme park
with local Masais have paid off.

For the past five years, the size of Kiniyei Conservancy,
where he now works, has doubled, and the number of poaching
cases have dropped.

The number of lions roaming the park has increased from 12 to
30, and the numbers of cheetahs, spotted hyenas, zebras,
wildebeests, giraffes and antelope have all doubled.

Zhuo, who hails from the southwestern city of Chongqing, said
his dream is to introduce this model of wildlife conservation to
other African countries and bring his valuable experience back
to China.

Over the years, hundreds of young Chinese volunteers have set
foot on the African continent.

Their hard work, be it in education, health care or
agriculture, is widely recognized and appreciated by local
residents.

"With more and more well-educated young people going to
Africa, non-governmental exchanges between China and Africa run
deeper," said Huo Jiangtao, an assistant at the Institute for
African Studies at Guangdong University of Foreign Studies.

Likewise, more and more African volunteers have been actively
involved in social work in China. Michel Tshimbombo Musampa is
one of them.

The 20-year-old is from the Republic of the Congo and lives
with his family in the Dengfeng community of Guangzhou.

Besides doing his part in running a family business, Musampa
volunteers to lend a hand to newcomers from his motherland and
visits local seniors who live alone.

Musampa said that he wants to serve the community because he
was helped by the community and wants to return the favor.

In Dengfeng, more than 30 foreigners have become registered
volunteers.

"Foreign volunteers have played an important part in bridging
our service to foreign residents," said Wang Haige, who offers
services to foreigners at the Comprehensive Service Center for
Dengfeng Community.

According to the Exit and Entry of Guangzhou, among the
nearly 7,500 African students who live in the city, a quarter
take part in cultural and voluntary activities.

"China-Africa cultural exchange is on the rise, especially
among young people," said Liu Hongwu, director of the Institute
of African Studies at Zhejiang Normal University.

"And this will provide a solid foundation for the further
development of bilateral relations."

Mouhamadou Moustapha Dieng, a Senegalese businessman who has
been living in Guangzhou for 16 years, plans to set up a
packaging factory in Senegal.

Dieng’s idea is to set up a processing factory in Senegal by
importing a production line from China.

The reason is simple: to ensure that the seafood and
agricultural products that cannot be exported now due to a lack
of processing capability reach the Chinese market in time.

Research by the Guangdong government has found that smaller
retail businesses dominated Guangzhou’s markets involving
African buyers 10 years ago.

Today, the percentage has dropped to 15 percent, while more
than 60 percent of procurement by African businesspersons is
done in bulk purchases.

"That is to say, China-Africa trade is becoming more
standardized," said Liu Jisen from Guangdong University of
Foreign Studies.

According to Chinese customs statistics, the volume of trade
between China and Africa reached nearly 100 billion U.S. dollars
in the first half of the year, an increase of 17.3 percent.

Dieng said he is very interested in measures proposed by the
Chinese government to bolster China-Africa economic and trade
cooperation.

He hopes the upcoming Forum on China-Africa Cooperation in
Beijing will bring the two partners closer together.

Dieng added that he plans to send his 17-year-old son, who is
learning Chinese in a Confucius Institute in Senegal, to study
at a Chinese university.

Like Dieng, Zhu Layi, the founding president of the
Africa-Guangdong Business Association, also has high expectation
for the upcoming summit.

These days, Zhu is involved in the construction of the Ogun-Guangdong
Free Trade Zone, a park located in Ogun State of Nigeria in West
Africa, and Kenya’s Pearl River Special Economic Zone in East
Africa. He also plans to set up an African business school.

"In the future, more ordinary people will be involved in and
benefit from China-Africa cooperation," said Liu Jisen.

"The Chinese dream and the African dream will be more deeply
integrated."